Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman for yielding. Madam Speaker, I understand that this is a critical issue that we need to address, but I believe that the gentleman is not accurate. HHS employees are going to get paid. This money that is being appropriated is for the special, additional services that we need to make sure are available. I don't think there is a question of HHS employees not getting paid. More importantly, it is an issue as to whether or not the services are going to be available to provide the humanitarian treatment that the gentleman talks about, and I think we are in full agreement. I will say again that I think the Senate's action is helpful. It was bipartisan. Very frankly, I think it, hopefully, is going to help us get to some bipartisan agreement here. Frankly, I will tell the gentleman, we thought we were pretty close to a bipartisan agreement with the Republicans, and the Republicans and Democrats have been working on this in the committee, as the gentleman knows. We were pretty close to agreement. We didn't get there. They got to it in the Senate, which meant the Democrats went along with what the majority could support because they are the majority. Hopefully, we can do that here and get a bipartisan bill. I will tell the gentleman that I am working very hard and am very focused on getting a bill done so that we do not leave here without a bill having been passed to provide this humanitarian relief that is so essential.”